Mythic responds to negative Land of the Dead community poll
Special thanks to Mythic Community Coordinator, Jess Folsom, for pulling together these responses for us.
Q. What do you make of community poll results?
We work very closely with our fan sites, especially Warhammer Alliance, and view the polls as a valuable source of player feedback. We take all poll results seriously, and carefully evaluate the subject of the poll, the wording of the questions, who is allowed to vote, and other factors, especially if there is an overwhelming majority vote. It's important to note that polls alone will never force a change, but we do take them into consideration, along with all other feedback we receive.
Q. What were you able to glean from the recent Land of the Dead poll on Warhammer Alliance in regards to its impact on open RvR? Did the poll results fuel any in-game changes?
The poll helped to confirm what we were seeing on our end -- the initial release of Rise of the Tomb Kings on June 24th did have an impact on open RvR activity at the time the poll was taken, particularly in Tier 4. We saw a large surge of players flocking to the new areas, and enjoying all of the exciting and innovative new content and RvR battles that the Land of the Dead offered. We see this kind of initial surge of interest any time we release new content such as weekend Scenario events or Live Events.
Now that the Land of the Dead has been out for a little over a month, and more players are equipped with the powerful talismans and vessel weapons available, players are often making the choice to continue to stay in Tier 4 RvR and fight in the campaign, even when their Realm controls access to the new area. As a result, Tier 4 open RvR is back in full force, with warband-on-warband skirmishes, epic Keep battles, and lots of Scenario action going on.
Players enjoy the added purpose to zone captures that ownership of the Land of the Dead provides, and appreciate that they have a choice to stay in the Tier 4 open RvR Lakes, or venture into the Land of the Dead, and feel that the choices complement each other. One change we made recently (7/23) to Expedition Resources was based on player feedback, and has had great results.
The number of Expedition Resources necessary to win control of the Land of the Dead has been reduced to 500, and the number of resources awarded from zone control is now 250. This will make the Expedition Resources earned from defeating enemy players in open RvR have a greater impact on securing the Land of the Dead. The number of Expedition Resources that drop from players and NPCs in Tier 4 RvR lakes and invaded capital cities will remain the same, which greatly increases their relative worth toward gaining control of the Land of the Dead.
What this change did, was encourage open RvR even more and allow for faster control of the Land of the Dead, and made player kills more valuable toward gaining that control. This is the kind of adjustment we can (and do) make as a result of player feedback from our official forums, in-game feedback forms, and fan sites.
Since the initial release of the Land of the Dead, and the Warhammer Alliance poll, we are now seeing very active Tier 4 RvR lakes, where the Land of the Dead is a reward for open RvR victories. If players still feel that the Land of the Dead is impacting open RvR, we absolutely encourage you to let us know and offer your suggestions on our official WAR forums. Our number one goal for the Land of the Dead is that is a fun, challenging, and rewarding place to control, and add a tangible incentive to participate in Tier 4 open RvR, not to take away from it.
We are continuing to evaluate Tier 4 open RvR activity versus the Land of the Dead, and encourage our players to continue to offer feedback.
